The cultivation of mindfulness of moment-to-moment non-judgmental awareness sounds very simple but it’s actually just
about the hardest work in the world for human beings because we get so caught up in our conditioned states of mind and when we begin to cultivate awareness it’s really important to bring a certain attitudinal approach to it so that we’re not trying to force anything to happen or sit in the kind of rigid posture or attain some special state that we sort of think, “Ah, that’s what it is,” or “I’ll be enlightened,” or “I’ll just be permanently wise,” or “I’ll be this,” or “I’ll be that.”

The problem isn’t actually with the “enlightenment” or the “permanently wise” or anything like that. The problem is with the personal pronouns, I, me, and mine. They are very very problematic because who we think we are and who we actually are are very different and there’s a huge separation. Who we think we are is very very small compared to who we actually are. And so
when we are cultivating mindfulness in MBSR or with people we encourage a certain kind of attitude that’s brought to the formal and informal practices that you can keep in mind through your daily life as well. And these attitudes – there are seven of them that I put in Full Catastrophe Living when I was writing it because if you start to cultivate acceptance, if you start to cultivate non-striving, if you start to cultivate letting go, or letting be, if you start to cultivate trust and patience, these qualities can be cultivated in everyday life with your children, with your parents, with your partner or spouse, with your colleagues at work and so it’s a way of reinforcing and deepening the actual formal and informal meditation practices.

The landmark work on mindfulness, meditation, and healing, now revised and updated after twenty-five years
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